


PS 




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J 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap. Coirvright No... 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



OF AMEl 



What is Worth While Series. 



AFTER COLLEGE, WHAT? For Girls. By Mrs. 

Helen E. Starrett. 
ART OF LIVING (THE). By F. Emory Lyon. 
BLESSING OF CHEERFULNESS (THE). By Rev. 

J. R. Miller, D.D. 
BESIDE THE STILL WATERS. By Rev. J. R. Miller. 

D.D. 
CHILDREN'S WING (THE). By Elizabeth Glover. 
CHRIST-FILLED LIFE (THE). By C. C. Hall, D.D. 
CONFLICTING DUTIES. By E. S. Elliott. 
CULTURE AND REFORM. By Anna R. Brown, Ph.D. 
DO WE BELIEVE IT? By E. S. Elliott. 
EXPECTATION CORNER. By E. S. Elliott. 
FAMILY MANNERS. Bv Elizabeth Glover. 
GENTLE HEART (A). By the Rev. J. R. Miller, D.D. 
GIRLS : Faults and Ideals. By Rev. J. R. Miller, D.D. 
GIVING WHAT WE HAVE. Bv Anna R. Brown, Ph.D. 
GOLDEN RULE IN BUSINESS. By Rev. C. F. Dole. 
HAPPY LIFE THE). Bv Charles W. Eliott, LL.D. 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION. By T. DeWitt Talmage, 

D.D. 
J. COLE. Bv Emma Gellibrand. 

JESSICA'S FIRST PRAYER. By Hesba Stretton. 
KING OF THE GOLDEN RIVER. By John Ruskin. 
LADDIE. Bv the author of " Miss Toosey's Mission." 
LOVE AND' FRIENDSHIP. Bv Ralph Waldo Emerson. 
MASTER AND MAN. Bv Count Tolstoi. 
MISS TOOSEY'S MISSION. By the author of " Laddie." 
PATHS OF DUTY (THE). By Dean Farrar. 
REAL HAPPENINGS. Bv Mrs. Mar\' B. Claflin. 
SECRETS OF HAPPY HOME LIFE. By Rev. J. R. 

Miller, D.D. 
SELF-CULTURE. By Wm. E. Channing, D.D. 
SHIPS AND HAVENS. By Rev. Henr%' Van Dyke, D.D. 
STILLNESS AND SERVICE. Bv E." S. ElUott. 
SWEETNESS AND LIGHT. By'Matthew Arnold. 
TALKS ABOUT A FINE ART. By EHzabeth Glover. 
TELL JESUS. Bv Anna Shipton. 
TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE. Bv E. S. Elliott. 
TRUE WOMANHOOD. Bv W. Cunningham, D.D. 
TWO PILGRIMS (THE). By Count Ly of N. Tolstoi. 
VICTORY OF OUR FAITH. Bv Anna R. Brown, Ph.D. 
WHAT IS WORTH WHILE. By Anna R. Brown, Ph.D. 
WHAT MEN LIVE BY. By Count Lvof N. Tolstoi. 
WHEN THE KING COMES TO HIS OWN. By E. 

S. Elliott. 
WHERE LOVE IS, THERE GOD IS ALSO. By L. 

N. Tolstoi. 
YOUNG MEN : Faults and Ideals. Rev. J. R. Miller, D.D. 



For sale by all booksellers, or sent, postpaid, by the 
publishers, on receipt of 35c. 



Thomas Y.Growell & Co., NewYork & Boston, 



SHIPS AND HAVENS 



/by 
HENRY VAN DYKE 

AUTHOR OF "little RIVERS," " THE STORY OF THE OTHER WISE MAN, 
" THE GOSPEL FOR AN AGE OF DOUBT," ETC. 



APB28: ,U 



k-« 



»5 * iy.5.2. 



NEW YORK: 46 East Fourteenth Street 

THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY 

BOSTON: 100 Purchase Street 



7331/7 



Copyright, 1897, 
By Thomas Y. Crowell & Company. 



C. J. Petees & Son, TrpoGBArnEBS, Boston. 



A. MUDGE & Son, Pbintebs. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

I. PiLGKIMS OF THE SeA 5 

II. Whither Bound ? 10 

III. The Haven of Wokk 14 

Pleasure 16 

Wealth 19 

Fame 23 

Usefulness 26 

lY. The Haven of Character 28 

The Force of the Ideal 29 

Powerful Day-dreaais 30 

The Two Paths 31 

Christian Consummation 32 

y. The Last Port 33 

The Strength of Wishes 35 

The Passion of Immortality 36 

3 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 



I. PILGRIMS OF THE SEA. 

Of all the things that man has made, none is so full 
of interest and charm, none possesses so distinct a life 
and character of its own, as a ship. 

" Ships are but boards," says Shylock in The Mer- 
chant of Venice. But we feel that this is a thoroughly 
wooden opinion, one of those literal judgments which 
stick to the facts and miss the truth. Ships have some- 
thing more in them than the timbers of which they are 
made. Human thought and human labor and human 
love, — the designer's clever conception, the builder's 
patient toil, the explorer's daring venture, the merchant's 
costly enterprise, the sailor's loyal affection, the trav- 
eller's hopes and fears, — all the manifold sympathies 
of humanity, inform the dumb pilgrims of the sea with 
a human quality. There is a spirit within their oaken 
ribs, a significance in their strange histories. 

The common language in which Ave speak of them is 
an unconscious confession of this feeling. We say of a 
ship, "She sails well. She minds her helm quickly. 
The wind is against her, but she makes good headway. 
We wish her a prosperous voyage." We endow her with 
personality ; and, as if to acknowledge the full measure 
of our interest, we express it in terms which belong to 
the more interesting sex. 

5 



6 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

One reason for this is undoubtedly the fact that the 
ship appears to us as a traveller to an unseen, and often 
an unknown, haven. It is the element of mystery, of 
adventure, of movement towards a secret goal, that fas- 
cinates our imagination, and draws our sympathy after 
it. When this is wanting, the ship loses something of 
her enchantment. 

There is a little cottage where I have spent many 
summers on the sleepy southern shore of Long Island. 
From the white porch we could look out upon a shal- 
low, land-locked bay. There we saw, on every sunny day, 
a score of sailboats, flickering to and fro on the bright 
circle of water in SAvallow-flights, with no aim but their 
own motion in the pleasant breeze. It was a flock of 
little play-ships, — a pretty sight, but it brought no stir 
to the thought, no thrill to the emotions. 

From the upper windows of the house the outlook 

surpassed a long line of ragged sand-dunes, and ranged 

across 

" The unplumbed, salt, estranging sea." 

There went the real ships, of all shapes and sizes, of 
all rigs and models ; the great steamers, building an airy ' 
pillar of cloud by day, a flashing pillar of fire by night ; 
the ragged coasters, with their patched and dingy sails ; 
the slim, swift yachts, hurrying by in gala-dress, as if 
in haste to arrive at some distant, merry festival of 
Neptune's court. Sometimes they passed in groups, like 
flights of plover ; sometimes in single file, like a flock of 
wild swans ; sometimes separate and lonely, one appear- 
ing and vanishing before the next hove in sight. 

When the wind was from the north they hugged the 
shore. With a glass one could see the wrinkled, weather- 
beaten face of the man at the wheel, and the short pipe 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 7 

smoking between his lips. When the wind was southerly 
and strong they kept far away, creeping slowly along 
the rim of the horizon. On a fair breeze they dashed 
along, wing and wing, with easy, level motion. When 
the wind was contrary they came beating in and out, 
close-hauled, tossing and laboring over the waves. It 
was a vision of endless variety and delight. But behind 
it all, giving life and interest to the scene, was the in- 
visible thought of the desired haven. 

Whither is she travelling, that long, four-masted 
schooner, with all her sails set to catch the fickle north- 
west breeze ? Is it in some languid bay of the West 
Indies, or in some rocky harbor of Patagonia, amid the 
rigors of the far southern winter, that she will cast 
anchor? Where is she bound, that dark little tramp- 
steamer, trailing voluminous black smoke behind her, 
and buffeting her way to the eastward in the teeth of the 
rising gale ? Is it in some sunlit port among the bare, 
purple hills of Spain, or in the cool shadows of some 
forest-clad ISTorwegian fiord, that she will find her moor- 
ings ? Whither away, ye ships ? What haven ? 

How often, and how exquisitely, this question of ships 
and havens has been expressed by the poets (in prose 
and verse), who translate our thoughts for us. Long- 
fellow recalls a dream of his childhood in the seaport- 
town of Portsmouth : — 

"I remember the black wharves and the slips, 
And the sea-tides tossing free; 
And Spanish sailors with bearded lips, 
And the beauty and mystery of the ships, 
And the magic of the sea. 
And the voice of that wayward song 
Is singing and saying still: 
' A boy's will is the wind's will, 
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.' " 



8 SHIPS AND RAVENS. 

George William Curtis wanders down to the Battery, 
and meditates on Sea from Shore : — 

" The sails were shaken out, and the ship began to move. It 
was a fair breeze perhaps, and no steamer was needed to tow 
her away. She receded down the bay. Friends turned back, — 
I could not see them, — and waved their hands, and wiped their 
eyes, and went home to dinner. Farther and farther from the 
ships at anchor, the lessening vessel became single and solitary 
upon the water. The sun sank in the west ; but I watched her 
still. Every flash of her sails, as she tacked and turned, thrilled 
my heart. ... I did not know the consignees nor the name of 
the vessel. I had shipped no adventure, nor risked any insu- 
rance, nor made any bet, but my eyes clung to her as Ariadne's 
to the fading sail of Theseus." 

And here is a bit of Eudyard Kipling's gusty music 
from The Seven Seas : — 

"The Liner she's a lady, an' she never looks nor 'eeds — 
The Man-o'-War's 'er 'usband, an' 'e gives 'er all she needs; 
But, oh, the little cargo-boats, that sail the wet seas roun', 
They're just the same as you and me, a-plyin' up an' down! " 

But it is Wordsworth, the most intimate and search- 
ing interpreter of delicate, half -formed emotions, who 
has given the best expression to the feeling that rises 
within us at sight of a journeying ship : — 

" With ships the sea was sprinkled far and nigh 
Like stars in heaven, and joyously it showed; 
Some lying fast at anchor in the road, 
Some veering up and down, one knew not why. 
A goodly Vessel did I then espy 
Come like a giant from a haven broad ; 
And lustily along the bay she strode, 
Her tackling rich, and of apparel high. 
This Ship was naught to me, nor I to her, 
Yet I pursued her with a Lover's look; 
This Ship to all the rest I did prefer: 
When will she turn, and whither? She will brook 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 9 

No tarrying: where she comes the winds must stir; 
On went she, and due north her journey took. 

"Where lies the Land to which yon Ship must go? 
Fresh as a lark mounting at hreak of day 
Festively she puts forth in trim array; 
Is she for tropic suns, or polar snow? 
What hoots the inquiry ? — Neither friend nor foe 
She cares for; let her travel where she may 
She finds familiar friends, a beaten way 
Ever before her, and a wind to blow. 
Yet still I ask, what haven is her mark? 
And, almost as it was when ships were rare, 
(From time to time, like Pilgrims, here and there 
Crossing the waters), doubt, and something dark, 
Of the old Sea some reverential fear 
Is with me at thy farewell, joyous Bark!" 

And is not this a parable, beautiful and suggestive, of 
the way in which we look out, in our thoughtful moods, 
upon the ocean of human life, and the men and women 
who are voyaging upon it ? In them also the deepest 
element of interest is that they are in motion. They 
are all going somewhither. They are not stationary 
objects in our view. They are not even, in this aspect, 
parts of the great tide of being in which they float. 
They are distinct, individual, separate. We single them 
out one by one. Each one is a voyager, with a port to 
seek, a course to run, a fortune to experience. The 
most interesting question that we can ask in regard to 
them is : Whither bound ? What haven ? 

But this inquiry comes to us now not as an idle or a 
curious question. For, first of all, we feel that these 
men and women are not strangers to us. We know why 
we take a personal interest in one more than in another. 
We know why we "pursue them with a lover's look.'' 
It is as if the "joyous Bark" carried some one that we 
knew, as if we could see a familiar face above the bul- 



10 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

warkS; and hear a well-beloved voice hailing us across 
the waves. And then we realize that we also are en 
voyage. We do not stand on the shore as spectators; 
we, too, are out on the ocean, sailing. All the '^ reve- 
rential fear of the old Sea," the peril, the mystery, the 
charm, of the voyage, come home to our own experience. 
The question becomes pressing, urgent, importunate, as 
we enter into the depth of its meaning. Surely there is 
nothing that we can ever ask ourselves in which we 
have a closer, deeper interest, or to which we need to 
find a clearer, truer answer, than this simple, direct 
question : What is our desired haven in the venturesome 
voyage of life? 

II. WHITHER BOUND? 

I want to talk with you about this question in this 
little book, as a writer may talk with a reader across 
the unknown intervals of time and space. The book 
that does not really speak to you is not worth much. 
And unless you really hear something, and make some 
kind of an answer to it, you do not truly read. 

There is a disadvantage, of course, in the fact that 
you and I do not know each other and speak face to 
face. Who you are, into whose hands this book has 
come, I cannot tell. And to you, I am nothing but a 
name. Where you may be, while you turn these pages, 
I cannot guess. Perhaps you are sitting in your own 
quiet room after a hard day's work; perhaps you are 
reading aloud in some circle of friends around the open 
fire ; perhaps you are in the quiet woods, or out in the 
pleasant orchard under your favorite tree ; perhaps you 
are actually on the deck of a ship travelling across the 
waters. It is strange and wonderful to think of the 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 11 

many different places into which the words that I am 
now writing in this lonely, book-lined study may come, 
and of the many different eyes that may read them. 

But wherever you are, and whoever you may be, there 
is one thing in which you and I are just alike, at this 
moment, and in all the moments of our existence. We 
are not at rest ; we are on a journey. Our life is not a 
mere fact j it is a movement, a tendency, a steady, 
ceaseless progress towards an unseen goal. We are 
gaining something, or losing something, every day. 
Even when our position and our character seem to re- 
main precisely the same, they are changing. For the 
mere advance of time is a change. It is not the same 
thing to have a bare field in January and in July. The 
season makes the difference. The limitations that are 
childlike in the child are childish in the man. 

Everything that we do is a step in one direction or 
another. Even the failure to do something is in itself a 
deed. It sets us forward or backward. The action of 
the negative pole of a magnetic needle is just as real as 
the action of the positive pole. To decline is to accept 
— the other alternative. 

Are you richer to-day than you were yesterday ? 
No ? Then you are a little poorer. Are you better 
to-day than you were yesterday ? No ? Then you are 
a little worse. Are you nearer to your port to-day than 
you were yesterday? Yes, — you must be a little 
nearer to some port or other; for since your ship was 
first launched upon the sea of life, you have never been 
still for a single moment ; the sea is too deep, you could 
not find an anchorage if you would ; there can be no 
pause until you come into port. 

But what is it, then, the haven towards which you are 



12 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

making ? What is the goal that you desire and hope to 
reach ? What is the end of life towards which you are 
drifting or steering ? 

There are three ways in which we may look at this 
question, depending upon the point of view from which 
we regard human existence. 

When we think of it as a work, the question is, 
" What do we desire to accomplish ? ^' 

When we think of it as a growth, a development, a 
personal unfolding, the question is, " What do we desire 
to become ? " 

When we think of it as an experience, a destiny, the 
question is, " What do we desire to become of us ? ^' 

Do not imagine for an instant that these questions 
can be really separated. They are interwoven. They 
cross each other from end to end of the web of life. 
The answer to one question determines the answer to 
the others. We cannot divide our work from our selves, 
nor isolate our future from our qualities. A ship might 
as well try to sail north with her jib, and east with her 
foresail, and south with her mainsail, as a man to go 
one way in conduct, and another way in character, and 
another way in destiny. 

What we do belongs to what we are; and what we 
are is what becomes of us. 

And yet, as a matter of fact, there is a difference in 
these three standpoints from which we may look at our 
life ; and this difference not only makes a little variation 
in the view that we take of our existence, but also influ- 
ences unconsciously our manner of thinking and speak- 
ing about it. Most of the misunderstandings that arise 
when we are talking about life come from a failure to 
remember this. We are looking at the same thing, but 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 18 

we are looking from opposite corners of the room. We 
are discussing the same subject, but in different dialects. 

Some people — perhaps the majority — are of a prac- 
tical turn of mind. Life seems to them principally an 
affair of definite labor directed to certain positive results. 
They are usually thinking about what they are to do in 
the world, and what they are to get for it. It is a ques- 
tion of occupation, of accomplishment, of work and wages. 

Other people — and I think almost all serious-minded 
people when they are young, and life still appears fresh 
and wonderful to them — regard their existence from 
the standpoint of sentiment, of feeling, of personality. 
They have their favorite characters in history or fiction, 
whom they admire and try to imitate. They have their 
ideals, which they seek and hope to realize. Some vision 
of triumph over obstacles, and victory over enemies, 
some model of manhood or womanhood, shines before 
them. By that standard they test and measure them- 
selves. Towards that end they direct their efforts. The 
question of life, for them, is a question of attainment, of 
self-discipline, of self-development. 

Other people — and I suppose we may say all people 
at some time or other in their experience — catch a 
glimpse of life in still wider and more mysterious rela- 
tions. They see that it is not really, for any one of us, 
an independent and self-centred and self-controlled affair. 
They feel that its issues run out far beyond what we can 
see in this world. They have a deep sense of a future 
state of being towards which we are all inevitably moving. 
This movement cannot be a matter of chance. It must 
be under law, under responsibility, under guidance. It 
cannot be a matter of indifference to us. It ought to be 
the object of our most earnest concern, our most careful 



14 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

choice, our most determined endeavor. If there is a port 
beyond the horizon we should know where it lies, and 
how to win it. And so the question of life, in these 
profound moods which come to all of us, presents itself 
as a question of eternal destiny. 

Now, if we are to understand each other, if we are to 
get a view of the subject which shall be anything like a 
well-rounded view, a complete view, we must look at the 
question from all three sides. We must ask ourselves : 
What is our desired haven, first, in achievement; and 
second, in character; and last, in destiny? 

III. THE HAVEN OF WORK. 

Surely we ought to know what it is that we really 
want to do in the world, what practical result we desire 
to accomplish with our lives. And this is a question 
which it will be very wise to ask and answer before we 
determine what particular means we shall use in order 
to perform our chosen work and to secure the desired 
result. A man ought to know what he proposes to make 
before he selects and prepares his tools. A captain 
should have a clear idea of what port he is to reach 
before he attempts to lay his course and determine his 
manner of sailing. 

All these minor questions of ways and means must 
come afterwards. They cannot be settled at the outset. 
They depend on circumstances. They change with the 
seasons. There are many paths to the same end. One 
may be best to-day. Another may be best to-morrow. 
The wind and the tide make a difference. One way may 
be best for you, another way for me. The build of the 
ship must be taken into consideration. A flat-bottomed 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 15 

craft does best in the shallow water, along shore. A 
deep keel is for the open sea. 

But before we make up our minds how to steer from 
day to day, we must know where we are going in the 
long run. Then we can shape our course to fit our pur- 
pose. We can learn how to meet emergencies as they 
arise. We can change our direction to avoid obstacles 
and dangers. We can take a roundabout way if need 
be. If we keep the thought of our desired haven 
clearly before us, all the other points can be more easily 
and wisely settled ; and however devious and difficult 
the voyage may be, it will be a success when we get 
there. 

I am quite sure that a great deal of the confusion 
and perplexity of youth, and a great deal of the restless- 
ness and fickleness which older people often criticise so 
severely and so unjustly, come from the attempt to 
choose an occupation in life before the greater question 
of the real object of our life-work has been fairly faced 
and settled. " What are you going to do when you 
grow up ? '^ This is the favorite conundrum which the 
kind aunts and uncles put to the boys when they come 
home from school ; and of late they are beginning to 
put it to the girls also, since it has been reluctantly 
admitted that a girl may rightly have something to say 
about what she Avould like to do in the world. But how 
is it possible to make anything more than a blind guess 
at the answer, unless the boy or the girl has some idea 
of the practical end which is to be worked for. To 
choose a trade, a business, a profession, without knowing 
what kind of a result you want to get out of your labor, 
is to set sail in the dark. It is to have a course, but no 
haven ; an employment, but no vocation. 



16 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

There are really only four great practical ends for 
which men and women can work in this world, — Pleas- 
ure, Wealth, Fame, and Usefulness. We owe it to our- 
selves to consider them carefully, and to make up our 
minds which of them is to be our chief object in life. 

Pleasure is one aim in life, and there are a great 
many people who are following it, consciously or uncon- 
sciously, as the main end of all their efforts. Now, 
pleasure is a word which has a double meaning. It may 
mean the satisfaction of all the normal desires of our 
manhood in their due proportion, and in this sense it is 
a high and noble end. There is a pleasure in the intel- 
ligent exercise of all our faculties, in the friendship of 
nature, in the perception of truth, in the generosity 
of love, in the achievements of heroism, in the deeds of 
beneficence, in the triumphs of self-sacrifice. " It is not 
to taste sweet things/' says Carlyle, '^ but to do true and 
noble things, and vindicate himself under God's Heaven 
as a God-made man, that the poorest son of Adam 
dimly longs. Show him the way of doing that, the 
dullest daydrudge kindles into a hero." 

But pleasure as we commonly speak of it means some- 
thing very different from this. It denotes the imme- 
diate gratification of our physical senses and appetites 
and inclinations. There is a free gift of pleasant sensa- 
tion attached by the Creator to the fulfilment of our 
natural propensions. The taking of food, for example, 
not only nourishes the body, but also gratifies the pal- 
ate; the quenching of thirst is agreeable to the senses 
as well as necessary to the maintenance of life. No 
sane and wholesome thinker has ventured to deny that 
it is lawful and wise to receive this gratuitous gift of 
pleasure, and rejoice in it, as it comes to us in this 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 17 

world wherein God has caused to grow " every tree that 
is pleasant to the sight and good for food.'^ But when 
we make the reception of the agreeable sensation the 
chief end and motive of our action, when we direct our 
will and our effort to the attainment of this end, then 
we enter upon a pleasure-seeking life. We make that 
which should be our servant to refresh and cheer us, 
our master to direct and rule and drive us. 

The evil nature of this transformation is suggested in 
the very names which we give to human conduct in 
which the gratification of the senses has become the 
controlling purpose. The man who lives for the sake 
of the enjoyment that he gets out of eating and drinking 
is a glutton or a drunkard. The man who measures the 
success and happiness of his life by its physical sensa- 
tions, whether they be coarse and brutal or delicate and 
refined, is a voluptuary. 

A pleasure-seeking life, in this sense, when we think 
of it clearly and carefully, is one which has no real end 
or goal outside of itself. Its aim is unreal and transi- 
tory, a passing thrill in nerves that decay, an expe- 
rience that leads nowhere, and leaves nothing behind it. 
Eobert Burns knew the truth of what he wrote : — 

" But i^leasures are like poppies spread, 
You seize the flower, the bloom is shed! " 

The man who chooses pleasure as the object of his life 
has no real haven, but is like a boat that beats up and 
down and drifts to and fro, merely to feel the motion 
of the waves and the impulse of the wind. When the 
voyage of life is done he has reached no port, he has 
accomplished nothing. 

One of the wisest of the ancients, the Stoic philoso- 



18 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

pher Seneca, wrote a letter to his brother Gallio (the 
Eoman governor before whom St. Paul was tried in 
Corinth), in which he speaks very frankly about the 
folly of a voluptuous life. 

" Those who have permitted pleasure to lead the van . . . 
lose virtue altogether, and yet they do not possess pleasure, but 
are possessed by it ; and are either tortured by its absence, or 
choked by its excess, being wretched if deserted by it, and yet 
more wretched if overwhelmed by it; like those who are caught 
in the shoals of the Syrtes, and at one time are stranded on dry 
ground, and at another tossed on the furious billows. ... As 
we hunt wild beasts with toil and peril, and even when they are 
caught find them an anxious possession, for they often tear their 
keepers to pieces, even so are great iDleasures; they turn out to 
be great evils, and take their owners prisoner." 

This is the voice of human prudence and philosophy. 
The voice of religion is even more clear and piercing. 
St. Paul says of the pleasure-seekers: "Whose end is 
destruction, whose god is their belly, whose glory is 
their shame, who mind earthly things." And in another 
place, lest we should forget that this is as true of women 
as it is of men, he says : " She that liveth in pleasure is 
dead while she liveth." That saying is profoundly true. 
It goes to the bottom of the subject. A pleasure-seek- 
ing life is a living death, because its object perishes 
even while it is attained, and at the end nothing is left 
of it but dust and corruption. 

Think of the result of existence in the man or woman 
who has lived chiefly to gratify the physical appetites ; 
think of its real emptiness, its real repulsiveness, when 
old age comes, and the senses are dulled, and the roses 
have faded, and the lamps at the banquet are smoking 
and expiring, and desire fails, and all that remains is 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 19 

the fierce, insatiable, ugly craving for delights which 
have fled f orevermore ; think of the bitter, burning va- 
cancy of such an end, — and you must see that pleasure 
is not a good haven to seek in the voyage of life. 

But what of wealth as a desired haven ? When we 
attempt to consider this subject we have especial need 
to follow Dr. Samuel Johnson's blunt advice and ^^ clear 
our minds of cant." There is a great deal of foolish 
railing against wealth, which takes for granted, now 
that it is an unsubstantial and illusory good, and now 
that it is not a good at all, but only an unmixed evil, 
and the root of all other evils. Many preachers and 
moralists talk about wealth in this way; but they do 
not really think about it in this way. They know 
better. And when young people discover and observe 
the curious inconsistency between the teacher's words 
and his thoughts, as illuminated by his conduct, they 
are likely to experience a sense of disappointment, and 
a serious revulsion from doctrine which does not seem 
to be sincere. 

Wealth is simply the visible result of human labor, or 
of the utilization of natural forces and products, in such 
a form that it can be exchanged. A gallon of water 
in a mountain lake is not wealth. But the same gallon 
of water conveyed through an aqueduct and delivered in 
the heart of a great city represents a certain amount of 
wealth, because it has a value in relation to the wants 
of men. A tree growing in an inaccessible forest is not 
wealth. But a stick of timber which can be delivered in 
a place where men are building houses is a bit of wealth. 

Now, the symbol and measure of wealth is money. It 
is the common standard by which the value of different 
commodities is estimated, and the means by which they 



20 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

are exchanged. It is not a dream nor a delusion. It is 
something real and solid. It is deserving of our respect 
under certain conditions and within certain limitations. 
The man who professes an absolute contempt for money 
is either a little of a fool or a good deal of a fraud. It 
represents a product of labor and a form of power. 
It is worth working for. When a man has won it, there 
it is — a fact and a force. He can handle it, use it, dis- 
pose of it, as he chooses. 

But stop a moment ; let us think ! Is that altogether 
true ? It is partly true, no doubt ; for every particle of 
wealth, or of its symbol, money, is an actual possession 
of which its owner can dispose. But it is not the whole 
truth ; for the fact is that he 77uist dispose of it, because 
that is the only way in which it becomes available as 
wealth. A piece of money in an old stocking is no more 
than a leaf upon a tree. It is only when the coin is 
taken out and used that it becomes of value. And the 
nature of the value depends upon the quality of the use. 

Moreover, it is not true that a man can dispose of his 
money as he chooses. The purposes for which it can be 
used are strictly bounded. There are many things that 
he cannot buy with it; for example, health, long life, 
wisdom, a cheerful spirit, a clear conscience, peace of 
mind, a contented heart. 

You never see the stock called Happiness quoted on 
the exchange. How high would it range, think you, — 
a hundred shares of Happiness Preferred, guaranteed 
7%, seller 30? 

And there are some things that a man cannot do with 
his wealth. For instance, he cannot carry it with him 
when he dies. No system of transfer has been estab- 
lished between the two worlds; and a large balance 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 21 

here does not mean a balance on the other side of the 
grave. The property of Dives did not fall in value 
when he died, and yet he became a pauper in the 
twinkling of an eye. 

There is no question but that those who live to win 
wealth in this world have a more real and substantial 
end in view than the mere pleasure-seekers. But the 
thing that we ought to understand and remember is pre- 
cisely what that end is. It is the acquisition in our 
hands of a certain thing whose possession is very brief, 
and whose value depends entirely upon the use to which 
it is put. Now, if we make the mere gaining of that 
thing the desired haven of our life, we certainly spend 
our strength for naught, and our labor for that which 
satisfieth not. We narrow and contract our whole exist- 
ence. We degrade it by making it terminate upon 
something which is only a sign, a symbol, behind which 
we see no worthy and enduring reality. 

It is for this reason that the " blind vice " of avarice, 
as Juvenal calls it, has been particularly despised by 
the wise of all lands and ages. There is no other fault 
that so quickly makes the heart small and hard. 

"They soon grow old who grope for gold 
In marts where all is bought and sold; 
Who live for self, and on some shelf 
In darkened vaults hoard up their pelf; 
Cankered and crusted o'er with mould, 
For them their youth itself is old." 

Kor is there any other service that appears more un- 
profitable and ridiculous in the end, when the reward 
for which the money-maker has given his life is stripped 
away from him with a single touch, and he is left with 
his trouble for his pains. 



22 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

"If thou art rich, thou'rt poor; 
For like an ass whose back with ingots bows, 
Thou bear'st thy heavy burden but a journey, 
And death unloads thee." 

But perhaps you imagine that no one is in danger of 
making that mistake, no one is so foolish as to seek 
wealth merely for its own sake. Do yQu think so ? 
Then, what shall we say of that large class of men, so 
prominent and so influential in modern society, whose 
energies are desperately consecrated to the winning of 
great fortunes ? 

So far as their life speaks for them, they have no real 
ambition beyond that. They are not the leaders in 
noble causes, the sustainers of beneficent enterprises. 
They have no refined and elevated tastes to gratify. 
They are not the promoters of art or science, the adorn- 
ers of their city with splendid buildings, the supporters 
of humane and beautiful charities. They have no large 
plans, no high and generous purposes. They have no 
public spirit, only an intense private greed. All that we 
can say of them is that they are rich, and that they 
evidently want to be richer. 

They sit like gigantic fowls brooding upon nests of 
golden eggs, which never hatch. Their one desire is not 
to bring anything out of the eggs, but to get more eggs 
into their nest. It is a form of lunacy — auromania. 

But let us not suppose that these notorious examples 
are the only ones who are touched with this insanity. 
It is just the same in the man who is embittered by 
failure, as in the man who is elated by success ; just the 
same in those who make it the chief end of life to raise 
their hundreds of dollars to thousands, as in those who 
express their ambition in terms of seven figures. Gov- 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 23 

etoiisness is idolatry of wealth. It may be paid to a 
little idol as well as to a big one. Avarice may be mar- 
ried to Poverty, and then its offspring is named Envy ; 
or it may be married to Eiches, and then its children 
are called Purse-pride and Meanness. Some people sell 
their lives for heaps of treasure, and some for a scant 
thirty pieces of silver, and some for nothing better than 
a promissory note of fortune, without endorsement. 

There are multitudes of people in the world to-day 
who are steering and sailing for Ophir, simply because 
it is the land of gold. What will they do if they reach 
their desired haven ? They do not know. They do not 
even ask the question. They will be rich. They will 
sit down on their gold. 

Let us look our desires squarely in the face ! To win 
riches, to have a certain balance in the bank, and a 
certain rating on the exchange, is a real object, a definite 
object ; but it is a frightfully small object for the devo- 
tion of a human life, and a bitterly disappointing reward 
for the loss of an immortal soul. If wealth is our 
desired haven, we may be sure that it will not satisfy us 
when we reach it. 

Well, then, what shall we say of fame as the chief 
end of life ? Here, again, we must be careful to dis- 
criminate between the thing itself and other things 
which are often confused with it. Fame is simply what 
our fellowmen think and say of us. It may be world- 
wide ; it may only reach to a single country or city ; it 
may be confined to a narrow circle of society. Trans- 
lated in one way, fame is glory ; translated in another 
way, it is merely notoriety. It is a thing which exists, 
of course ; for the thoughts of other people about us are 
just as actual as our thoughts about ourselves, or as the 



24 SHIPS AND HAVENS, 

character and conduct Avitli wliicli those thoughts are 
concerned. But the three things do not always corre- 
spond. 

You remember what Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes says, 
in The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Tahle, about the three 
Johns : — 

"1. The real John; known only to his Maker. 

2. John's ideal John; never the real one, and often very 

unlike him. 

3. Thomas's ideal John; never the real John, nor John's 

John, but often very unlike either." 

Now, the particular object of the life that makes fame 
its goal is this last John. Its success consists in the 
report of other people's thoughts and remarks about us. 
Bare, naked fame, however great it may be, can never 
bring us anything more than an instantaneous photo- 
graph of the way we look to other men. 

Consider what it is worth. It may be good or bad, 
flattering or painfully truthful. People are celebrated 
sometimes for their vices, sometimes for their follies. 
Anything out of the ordinary line will attract notice. 
Notoriety may be purchased by a colossal extravagance 
or a monumental absurdity. A person has been made 
notorious simply by showing himself "more kinds of a 
fool " than any one else in the community. 

Many men would be famous for their vanity alone, 
if it were not so common that it no longer serves as a 
mark of distinction. We often fancy that we are occu- 
pying a large place in the attention of the world, when 
really we do not even fill a pin-hole. 

To be governed in our course of life by a timorous 
consideration of what the world will think of us, is to 



SHIPS AND HAVENS, 25 

be even lighter and more fickle than a weathercock. It 
is to be blown about by winds so small and slight that 
they could not even lift a straw outside of our own ver- 
satile imagination. For what is " the world/' for whose 
admiration, or envy, or mere notice, we are willing to 
give so much ? " Mount up," says a wise man, " in a 
monomania of vanity, the number of those who bestow 
some passing thought upon you, as high as you dare; 
and what is this ' world ' but a very few miserable items 
of human existence, which, when they disappear, none 
will miss, any more than they will miss thyself ? " 

There is one point in which fame differs very essen- 
tially from wealth and pleasure. If it comes to us 
without being well-earned it cannot possibly be enjoyed. 
A pleasure may arrive by chance, and still it will be 
pleasant. A sum of money may be won by a gambler, 
and still it is real money ; he can spend it as he pleases. 
But fame without a corresponding merit is simply an 
unmitigated burden. I cannot imagine a more miserable 
position than that of the poor scribbler who allowed his 
acquaintances to congratulate him as the writer of George 
Eliot's early stories. To have the name of great wisdom, 
and at the same time to be a very foolish person, is to 
walk through the world in a suit of armor so much too 
big and too heavy for you that it makes every step a 
painful effort. To have a fine reputation and a mean 
character is to live a lie and die a sham. And this is 
the danger to which every one who seeks directly and 
primarily for fame is exposed. 

One thing is certain in regard to fame : for most of 
us it will be very brief in itself ; for all of us it will be 
transient in our enjoyment of it. 

When death has dropped the curtain we shall hear no 



26 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

more applause. And though we fondly dream that it 
will continue after we have left the stage, we do not 
realize how quickly it will die away in silence, while 
the audience turns to look at the new actor and the 
next scene. Our position in society Avill be filled as 
soon as it is vacated, and our name remembered only 
for a moment, — except, please God, by a few who have 
learned to love us, not because of faitie, but because we 
have helped them and done them some good. 

This thought brings us, you see, within clear sight of 
the fourth practical aim in life, — the one end that is 
really worth working for, — usefulness. To desire and 
strive to be of some service to the world, to aim at doing 
something which shall really increase the happiness and 
welfare and virtue of mankind, — this is a choice which 
is possible for all of us ; and surely it is a good haven 
to sail for. 

The more we think of it, the more attractive and de- 
sirable it becomes. To do some work that is needed, 
and to do it thoroughly well ; to make our toil count for 
something in adding to the sum total of what is actually 
profitable for humanity ; to make two blades of grass 
grow where one grew before, or, better still, to make 
one wholesome idea take root in a mind that was bare 
and fallow; to make our example count for something 
on the side of honesty, and cheerfulness, and courage, 
and good faith, and love, — this is an aim for life which 
is very wide, as wide as the world, and yet very definite, 
as clear as light. It is not in the least vague. It is 
only free ; it has the power to embody itself in a thou- 
sand forms without changing its character. Those who 
seek it know what it means, however it may be expressed. 
It is real and genuine and satisfying. There is nothing 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 27 

beyond it, because there can be no higiier practical re- 
sult of effort. It is tlie translation, through many lan- 
guages, of the true, divine purpose of all the work and 
labor that is done beneath the sun, into one final, uni- 
versal word. It is the active consciousness of personal 
harmony with the will of God who worketh hitherto. 

To have this for the chief aim in life ennobles and 
dignifies all that it touches. Wealth that comes as the 
reward of usefulness can be accepted with honor ; and, 
consecrated to further usefulness, it becomes royal. 
Fame that comes from noble service, the gratitude of 
men, be they few or many, to one who has done them 
good, is true glory ; and the influence that it brings is as 
near to godlike power as anything that man can attain. 
But whether these temporal rewards are bestowed upon 
us or not, the real desire of the soul is satisfied just in 
being useful. The pleasantest word that a man can hear 
at the close of the day, whispered in secret to his soul, 
is " Well done, good and faithful servant ! '' 

Christ tells us this : " He that loseth his life shall 
find it." ^' Whosever will be great among you, let him 
be your minister ; and whosoever will be chief among 
you, let him be your servant." 

Life is divine when duty is a joy. 

Do we accept these sailing orders ? Is it really the 
desired haven of all our activity to do some good in the 
world; to carry our share of the great world's burden 
which must be borne, to bring our lading of treasure, be 
it small or great, safely into the port of usefulness ? I 
wonder how many of us have faced the question and 
settled it. It goes very deep. 



28 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 



IV. THE HAVEN OF CHARACTER. 

But deeper still the question goes when we look at it 
in another light. Our life is made up, not of actions 
alone, but of thoughts and feelings and habitual affec- 
tions. These taken all together constitute what we call 
our present character. In their tendencies and impulses 
and dominant desires they constitute our future charac- 
ter, towards which we are moving as a ship to her haven. 

"What is it, then, for you and me, this intimate ideal, 
this distant self, this hidden form of personality which 
is our goal ? 

I am sure that we do not often enough put the prob- 
lem clearly before us in this shape. We all dream of 
the future, especially when we are young. 

"A boy's will is the wind's will, 
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts." 

But our dreams are too much like the modern stage, 
full of elaborate scenery and machinery, crowded with 
startling effects and brilliant costumes and magical trans- 
formations, but strangely vacant of all real character. 

The stuff of which our day-dreams are made is for 
the most part of very cheap material. We seldom weave 
into them the threads of our inmost spiritual life. We 
build castles in Spain, and forecast adventures in Bohe- 
mia. But the castle is without a real master. The 
hero of the adventure is vague and misty. We do not 
clearly recognize his face, or know what is in his heart. 

We picture ourselves as living here or there; we 
imagine ourselves as members of a certain circle of so- 
ciety, taking our places among the rich, the powerful, 
the "smart set." We fancy ourselves going through 



SHIPS ANB HAVENS. 29 

the various experiences of life, a fortunate marriage, a 
successful business career, a literary triumph, a political 
victory. Or perhaps, if our imagination is of a more 
sombre type, we foreshadow ourselves in circumstances 
of defeat and disappointment and adversity. But in 
all these reveries we do not really think deeply of our 
Selves. We do not stay to ask what manner of men 
and women we shall be, when we are living here or 
there, or doing thus or so. 

Yet it is an important question. Very much more 
important, in fact, than the thousand and one trifling 
interrogatories about the future with which we amuse 
our idle hours. 

And the strange thing is, that, though our ideal of 
future character is so often hidden from us, overlooked, 
forgotten, it is always there, and always potently, though 
unconsciously, shaping our course in life. " Every one,'' 
says Cervantes, " is the son of his own works.'' But his 
works do not come out of the air, by chance. They are 
wrought out in a secret, instinctive harmony with a con- 
ception of character which we inwardly acknowledge as 
possible and likely for us. 

When we choose between two lines of conduct, be- 
tween a mean action and a noble one, we choose also 
between two persons, both bearing our name, the one 
representing what is best in us, the other embodying 
what is worst. When we vacillate and alternate be- 
tween them, we veer, as the man in Eobert Louis Ste- 
venson's story veered, between Dr. Jekyll and Mr. 
Hyde. 

We say that we "make up our minds," to do a cer- 
tain thing or not to do it, to resist a certain temptation 
or to yield to it. It is true. We " make up our minds " 



30 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

in a deeper sense than we remember. In every case the 
ultimate decision is between two future selves, one with 
whom the virtue is harmonious, another with whom the 
vice is consistent. To one of these two figures, dimly 
concealed behind the action, we move forward. What 
we forget is, that, when the forward step is taken, the 
shadow will be myself. Character is eternal destiny. 

There is a profound remark in George Eliot's Mid- 
dlemarch which throws light far down into the abyss 
of many a lost life. "We are on a perilous margin 
when we begin to look passively at our future selves, 
and see our own figures led with dull consent into in- 
sipid misdoing and shabby achievement.'' But there is 
a brighter side to this same truth of life-philosophy. We 
are on a path which leads upward, by sure and steady 
steps, when we begin to look at our future selves with 
eyes of noble hope and clear purpose, and see our figures 
climbing, with patient, dauntless effort, towards the 
heights of true manhood and womanhood. Visions like 
these are Joseph's dreams. They are stars for guid- 
ance. They are sheaves of promise. The very memory 
of them, if we cherish it, is a power of pure restraint 
and generous inspiration. 

Oh for a new generation of day-dreamers, young men 
and maidens who shall behold visions, idealists who 
shall see themselves as the heroes of coming conflicts, 
the heroines of yet unwritten epics of triumphant com- 
passion and stainless love. From their hearts shall 
spring the renaissance of faith and hope. The ancient 
charm of true romance shall flow forth again to glorify 
the world in the brightness of their ardent eyes, — 

*'The light that never was on land or sea, 
The consecration and the poet's dream." 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 31 

As they go out from the fair gardens of a visionary 
youth into the wide, confused, turbulent field of life, 
they will bring with them the marching music of a high 
resolve. They will strive to fulfil the fine prophecy of 
their own best desires. They will not ask whether life 
is worth living, — they will make it so. They will 
transform the sordid " struggle for existence '^ into a 
glorious effort to become that which they have admired 
and loved. 

But such a new generation is possible only through 
the regenerating power of the truth that " a man's life 
consisteth not in the abundance of the things that he 
possesseth.'^ We must learn to recognize the real reali- 
ties, and to hold them far above the perishing trappings 
of existence which men call real. 

The glory of our life below 

Comes not from what we do or what we know, 

But dwells forevermore in what we are. 

"He only is advancing in life,'' says John Euskin, 
"whose heart is getting softer, whose blood warmer, 
whose brain quicker, whose spirit is entering into Living 
peace. And the men who have this life in them are the 
true lords or kings of the earth — they, and they only." 

Now I think you can see what is meant by this ques- 
tion of the desired haven in character. What manner 
of men and women do we truly hope and wish to 
become ? 

The number of ideals seems infinite. But, after all, 
there are only two great types. St. Paul calls them 
" the carnal," and " the spiritual ; " and I know of no 
better names. 

The carnal type of character, weak or strong, clever 



32 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

or stupid, is always self -ruled, governed by its own appe- 
tites and passions, seeking its own ends, and, even when 
conformed to some outward law or code of honor, obe- 
dient only because it finds its own advantage or comfort 
therein. There is many a man who stands upright only 
because the pressure of the crowd makes it inconvenient 
for him to stoop. " The churl in spirit " may speak fair 
words because of those who hear; but in his heart he 
says the thing that pleases him, which is vile. 

The spiritual type of character is divinely ruled, sub- 
missive to a higher law, doing another will than its own, 
seeking the ends of virtue and holiness and unselfish 
love. It may have many inward struggles, many defeats, 
many bitter renunciations and regrets. It may appear 
far less peaceful, orderly, self-satisfied, than some of 
those who are secretly following the other ideal. Many 
a saint in the making seems to be marred by faults and 
conflicts from which the smug, careful, reputable sensu- 
alist is exempt. The difference between the two is not 
one of position. It is one of direction. The one, how- 
ever high he stands, is moving down. The other, how- 
ever low he starts, is moving up. 

We all know who it is that stands at the very summit 
of the spiritual pathway, — Jesus Christ, the Son of 
God, who became a perfect man, leaving us an example 
that we should follow in his steps. We know, too, the 
steps in which he trod, — obedience, devotion, purity, 
truthfulness, kindness, resistance of temptation, self- 
sacrifice. And we know the result of following him, 
until we come, in the unity of the faith and of the knowl- 
edge of the Son of God, unto a perfect manhood, unto 
the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. 

Which type of character do we honestly desire and 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 33 

expect to reach ? Let us not indulge in any delusions 
about it. Just as surely as our faces are hardening into 
a certain expression, ugly or pleasant, and our bodies 
are moving towards a certain condition of health, sound 
or diseased, so surely are our souls moving towards a 
certain type of character. Along which line are we 
looking and steering ? Along the line that leads to an 
older, grayer, stiffer likeness of our present selves, with 
all our selfishness and pride and impurity and incon- 
sistency and discontent confirmed and hardened ? Or 
the line that ends in likeness to Christ ? 

Surely we are voyaging blindly unless we know what 
haven of character our souls are seeking. Surely we 
are making a mad and base and fatal choice, unless we 
direct our course to the highest and the noblest goal. 
To know Christ is life eternal. To become like Christ 
is success everlasting. 

V. THE LAST PORT. 

There is still one more way of putting this question 
about our desired haven, — a way perhaps more common 
than the others, and therefore probably more natural, 
though I cannot believe that it is more important. It 
is, in fact, simply a carrying on of the first two questions 
beyond the horizon of mortal sight, a prolongation of the 
voyage of life upon the ocean of eternity. 

Almost all of us have an expectation, however dim 
and misty, of an existence of some kind after we have 
crossed the bar of death. Even those who do not be- 
lieve that this existence will be conscious, those who 
suppose that death ends all, so far as our thought and 
feeling are concerned, and that the soul goes out when 
the heart stops, — even the doubters of immortality fore- 



34 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

see a certain kind of a haven for their lives in the deep, 
dreamless, endless sleep of oblivion. There is no one 
now living who does not owe a clear and definite answer 
to the question : Where do you wish and expect to go 
when you die ? 

Now, I am quite sure that we have no right to try to 
separate this question of our haven after death from the 
questions in regard to our present aspirations and efforts 
in conduct and character. For every one who considers 
it soberly must see that our future destiny cannot possi- 
bly be anything else than the reward and consequence 
of our present life. Whether it be a state of spiritual 
blessedness, or an experience of spiritual woe, or simply 
a blank extinction, it will come as the result of the deeds 
done in the body. It will be the fitting and inevitable 
arrival at a goal towards which we have been moving 
in all our actions, and for which we have been preparing 
ourselves by all the secret affections and hopes and be- 
liefs which we are daily working into our characters. 

But there is a reason, after all, and a very profound 
reason, why we should sometimes put this question of 
our desired haven after death in a distinct form, and 
why we should try to give a true and honest answer 
to it, with an outlook that goes beyond the grave. 

It is because the answer will certainly determine our 
conduct now, and there is every reason to believe that it 
will affect the result hereafter. 

Men say that the future life is only a possibility, or 
at best a probability, and that it is foolish to waste 
our present existence in the consideration of problems to 
which the only answer must be a " perhaps," or " I hope 
so," or "I believe so." But is it not one of the very 
conditions of our advance, even in this world, that we 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 36 

should be forever going forward along lines which lie 
altogether in the region of the probable, and for which 
we have no better security than our own expectation and 
wish that they shall lead us to the truth, anticipated, but 
as yet unproved and really unknown ? 

" So far as man stands for anything,^' writes Professor 
William James, the psychologist, in his latest book. The 
Will to Believe, " and is productive or originative at all, 
his entire vital function may be said to have to deal with 
mayhes. Not a victory is gained, not a deed of faithful- 
ness or courage is done, except upon a maybe ; not a ser- 
vice, not a sally of generosity, not a scientific exploration 
or experiment or text-book, that may not be a mistake. 
It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another 
that we live at all. And often enough our faith before- 
hand in an uncertified result is the only thing that makes 
the result come trueP 

Surely this is certain enough in regard to the differ- 
ence between this present life as a dull and dismal 
struggle for the meat and drink that are necessary for 
an animal existence, and as a noble and beautiful conflict 
for moral and spiritual ends. It is the faith that maizes 
the result come true. As a man thinketh in his heart, so 
is he, and so is his world. For those whose thoughts 
are earthly and sensual, this is a beast's world. For 
those whose thoughts are high and noble and heroic, it 
is a hero's world. The strength of wishes transforms 
the very stuff of our existence, and moulds it to the 
form of our heart's inmost desire and hope. 

Why should it not be true in the world to come? 
Why should not the eternal result, as well as the pres- 
ent course, of our voyaging depend upon our own choice 
of a haven beyond the grave ? Christ says that it does. 



36 SHIPS AND HAVENS. 

" Seek ye first the kingdom of God." " Lay not up for 
yourselves treasures upon earth, but lay up for your- 
selves treasures in heaven." 

If the immortal life is a reality, is it not reasonable to 
think that the first condition of our attaining it is that 
we should personally wish for it, and strive to enter into 
it ? And must not our neglect or refusal to do this be 
the one thing that will inevitably shut us out from it, 
and make our eternity an outer darkness ? 

Mark you, I do not say that it is reasonable to sup- 
pose that we must be absolutely certain of the reality of 
heaven in order to arrive thither. We may have many 
doubts and misgivings. But deep down in our hearts 
there must be the wish to prove the truth of this great 
hope of an endless life with God, and the definite resolve 
to make this happy haven the end of all our voyaging. 

This is what the apostle means by " the power of an 
endless life." The passion of immortality is the thing 
that immortalizes our being. To be in love with heaven 
is the surest way to be fitted for it. Desire is the mag- 
netic force of character. Character is the compass of 
life. '^ He that hath this hope in him purifieth himself." 

Let me, then, put this question to you very simply 
and earnestly and personally. 

What is your desired haven beyond the grave ? It is 
for you to choose. There are no secret books of fate in 
which your course is traced, and your destiny irrevocably 
appointed. There is only the Lamb's book of life, in 
which new names are being written every day, as new 
hearts turn from darkness to light, and from the king- 
dom of Satan to the kingdom of God. No ship that 
sails the sea is as free to make for her port as you are 
to seek the haven that your inmost soul desires. And 



SHIPS AND HAVENS. 



37 



if your choice is right, and if your desire is real, so that 
you will steer and strive with God's help to reach the 
goal, you shall never be wrecked or lost. 

Yov of every soul that seeks to arrive at usefulness, 
which is the service of Christ, and at holiness, which is 
the likeness of Christ, and at heaven, which is the eter- 
nal presence of Christ, it is written : — 

So he hringeth them unto their desired haven. 

Like unto ships far off at sea, 

Outward or homeward bound, are we. 

Before, behind, and all around. 

Floats and swings the horizon's bound, 

Seems at its distant rim to rise 

And climb the crystal wall of the skies, 

And then again to turn and sink 

As if we could slide from its outer brink. 

Ah! it is not the sea. 

It is not the sea that sinks and shelves, 

But ourselves 

That rock and rise 

With endless and uneasy motion, 

Now touching the very skies. 

Now sinking into the depths of ocean. 

Ah! if our souls but poise and swing 

Like the compass in its brazen ring, 

Ever level and ever true 

To the toil and the task we have to do, 

We shall sail securely, and safely reach 

The Fortunate Isles, on whose shining beach 

The sights we see, and the sounds we hear, 

Will be those of joy and not of fear. 

Longfellow. 






iS.'i!.^,!!^ °P CONGRESS 



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